Random IE 7 Tip: Multiple Tabs

This is more of a productivity tip than anything else. I was working with a peer last week and noticed that when they open up Internet Explorer, they always went to Google. Okay, yeah, I do that—iGoogle is my home page.

“Oh, I can’t set Google as my home page, I prefer to use {this page} as the home page for {reason A, B, and C}; but I always need to search, so I usually go to Google.”

So, I introduced a commonly overlooked feature in IE 7.0–-multiple home page tabs.

Browse to the page you wish to add as an additional home page.

Click the Home button | Add or Change Home Page.

Select ‘Add this web page to your home pages tabs.’

Now, when you open Internet Explorer—both tabs will open. You can also manage this from Tools | Internet Options and by placing a different URL on each line in the multi-line text box. It works well and allows some larger mashup pages, like iGoogle, portals, PageFlakes, or Google Reader to start rendering ahead of time. 🙂